Not so keen on zoos

[agate]

Next week a "zoomobile" will be at this building so people can go look at the animals. I'll miss this event because more and more it seems to me that zoos are cruel. I've heard that some animals live a lot longer in captivity than in the wild but they're still wild animals, not domesticated like cats or dogs or cows, and they're just not meant to be cooped up and dependent on human beings.

People don't really need to look at unusual animals close up, do they? Even when I was a kid and there was no TV, there were magazines like Life and National Geographic that often showed wild animals.

I've been to quite a few zoos, and watching the big cats and other animals pacing and pacing up and down in a small space tells me they aren't really very contented. In Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo there was a ferret that did nothing but pace back and forth rapidly all day long in a glassed-in cage that wasn't more than a few inches longer than it was.

The zoos that have simulated natural habitats are better but still...

And the visitors are a large part of the problem. Too many people throw food and other things at the animals, and there's no stopping them. Prominent signs tell them not to but of course they don't pay any attention to signs.

Who wants a bunch of humans staring at you all the time anyway?